Which day?
by
Albinofrenchy
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· Score: 5, Interesting
From what I've seen, Amazon won't say which day the record was set, or why they won't say which day the record was set. Why the secrecy?
-- "A man is but the product of his thoughts what he thinks, he becomes."
-Mahatma Gandhi
Re:Which day?
by
Attar81
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· Score: 5, Informative
It says Thanksgiving Weekend, so I would guess that's it that Friday, the busiest shopping day of the year.
Re:Which day?
by
Keighvin
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· Score: 4, Informative
Oh yeah, Friday's big, no question - but it's a far cry from the next Monday, when everyone gets back to work (access to broadband) and begins hunting online for those things which they did not get over the weekend.
That's when the trend starts, and beyond that marketing has a larger impact than predictable human behavior; so it could have been any time from then until the last week before Christmas when it begins to peter out.
I work for a significant online competitor of Amazon's and am citing personal experience from having reviewed our bandwith, order rate, and income over the same key points of the holiday season.
-- Any spoon would be too big.
One-click
by
Anonymous Coward
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· Score: 3, Funny
Is there any way I can buy all items on said list with One Click, considering it is their novel patented original technological innovation?
SEATTLE (AP) - Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) on Monday said sales of consumer electronics surpassed book sales for the first time and was its largest sales category over the Thanksgiving weekend, launching the online retailer's busiest holiday selling season in 10 years.
So, erm, they had a bigger day back in like, 1994?
Funny coincidence?
by
AndreyF
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· Score: 3, Insightful
I bought 5 books on Amazon that day-- I used up my gift certificates from Christmas and ordered a textbook for next semester.
I hear the rainforest is still in need of saving, if you'd like a cause celebre...
-- For more information, click here.
32 items per second? Wow!
by
mOoZik
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· Score: 3, Interesting
I don't mean to be a KW (Karma Whore), but that is a staggering amount. Looking at it from a geek perspective, their system has to be such to be able to handle hundreds of thousands of simultaneous surfers and dozens of simultaneous buyers. They clearly have managed to scale-up their operations in such a way that does not negatively impact the operation of their site to the detriment of sales. Way to go, Jeff & Co!
Re:32 items per second? Wow!
by
Anonymous Coward
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· Score: 5, Interesting
I'll let you in on a little secret -
Amazon.com's codebase was C (now most likely migrated to C++, to take advanatge of things lik OOP among other reasons). It consisted of a gazillion modules which compiled to give you ONE BINARY, called obidos - check out the URL then you'll see what I'm saying. This one binary is then tied to Apache, and then fed out to their 500+ webservers. But the beauty of it is there redundancy measures. At any given time there are 3 copies the binary, a, b & c. a = The latest code. b = yesterday's stable build. c = another stable build. In case there's a bug in some build, they simply have to flip the switch to get an up and running site. It was great, but the part that's a BITCH is developing this stuff. Imagine having to re-compile all of Amazon, just to FIX A BLASTED TYPO. Posting anonymously for obvious reasons...
Re:32 items per second? Wow!
by
Anonymous Coward
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· Score: 3, Interesting
Here's another secret: Amazon is mostly migrated to a better system, called Gurupa (any page with 'gp/' in it), where thigns are actually modular and more maintainable. Obidos will eventually be removed. The redundancy measures are completely different now too.
(yeah, I know, not actually a secret).
Profitability?
by
jacobcaz
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· Score: 4, Interesting
I wonder what the profit on those 2.8 million items was? It would be interesting to know if it was just a huge pile of loss leaders or bigger ticket items (which might shed some interesting light on the economy and holiday season in general).
I'm still hearing conflicting reports on the holiday season overall - it was great, it was terrible, it was tepid... I'm still not sure how things went down; I know this year my wife and I probably spent a little less than last year despite our earning over 40% more than last year.
This is great news...maybe. I would just like more context.
I'd like to point out that Amazon DOES NOT use MySQL before the MySQL kiddies say "see, it can scale!"
-- I don't respond to AC's.
Amazon will rule the world.
by
AndreyF
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· Score: 3, Interesting
Not only that, most of the pages on the site are either encrypted or customized (via datamining), or both. I wonder what kind of servers they're running?
Re:Amazon will rule the world.
by
Anonymous Coward
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· Score: 3, Interesting
The customization takes place using "macros" embedded in the HTML/XML of their web pages. These macros are actually C functions, which are called at runtime on the webserver - which runs a single binary called obidos.
Does anyone have any statistics on how many items say, a single retail store (like Wal-mart) sells in a single day? How about all of the stores in a chain. Data like that would help put things in perspective.
Re:For comparison?
by
jacobcaz
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· Score: 4, Informative
Does anyone have any statistics on how many items say, a single retail store (like Wal-mart) sells in a single day? How about all of the stores in a chain. Data like that would help put things in perspective.
Well, Wal-Mart has about 3500 stores (give or take a few) and 2.8 million items over 3500 stores is only 800 items per store. A Super Wal-Mart could do this in a few hours per store.
I would bet that what Wal-Mart does on an average day makes this look like peanuts in comparison. Not to take anything away from Amazon's one-day record, but it's not really a drop in the bucket for Wal-Mart. Remember, they have annual revenues of ~$250 Billion-with-a-B. That's an average daily reveue of $680,000,000.
What is it about that site...
by
abirdman
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· Score: 3, Insightful
What is it about the iWon.com site that makes me feel all slimy and dirty? Is it the fact that they're major purveyors of spam? Or could it be all the "popup blocker" ads they run to fund their site, duping the rubes into thinking there's a downloadable software solution to the problem that they and their ilk are doing everything to promote--the indiscriminate installation of spyware, malware, and popups.
It's mildly interesting that Amazon is breaking sales records, but I don't believe a word from that awful site... and as another poster already mentioned-- there's damn little content in the article.
-- Everything I've ever learned the hard way was based on a statistically invalid sample.
OneDay(tm) Shopping
by
SuperBanana
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· Score: 5, Funny
From what I've seen, Amazon won't say which day the record was set, or why they won't say which day the record was set. Why the secrecy?
OneDay shopping. You don't tell anyone about something you're patenting until AFTER you patent it! Jeez, pay attention.
Meanwhile, let's get some prior art going, people! I've got Monday.
Re:I'll bet...
by
Haydn+Fenton
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· Score: 4, Informative
As the article says, 32 items per second were sold on average during the day. So that would mean a store with, say, 16 tills, would all need to be processing more than two items per second every second.. I find that a little hard to believe.
2.8 Million, at 32 Items per second
by
Mean_Nishka
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· Score: 5, Funny
Re:No, the parent doesn't have a point.
by
dorsey
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· Score: 3, Informative
He had a point, you just missed it. He was pointing out the sloppy writing by whoever wrote that article. Saying "busiest... in 10 years" implies that they were busier 10 years ago. If it was absolutely necessary to point out that Amazon has been in business for that long, they should have said something like "busiest... in their 10 year history".
-- hinderfreude ('hin-dur-"froi-d&), n. The feeling of joy derived from being in the way.
Re:2.8 Million, at 32 Items per second
by
ch-chuck
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· Score: 3, Informative
That was true in 1998 but now you're way out of date:
A survey by Thomson First Call put analysts' average estimates at earnings of 39 cents a share on revenue of $2.42 billion.
In the fourth quarter of last year, the Seattle online merchant earned 17 cents a share on $1.95 billion in revenue.
32 per second? Whoop-de-doo!
by
Anonymous Coward
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· Score: 3, Insightful
Ever been in a Walmart? How many times to you hear a 'beep' as an item is registered at the checkout?
I suspect most large, busy stores clock around 20-30 items sold per second on a regular basis. An enterprise the scale of WalMart might clock in thousands per second for all stores on exceptionally busy days.
This might be a 'record day' for Amazon, but it's hardly news.
Slashdot Mirror
From what I've seen, Amazon won't say which day the record was set, or why they won't say which day the record was set. Why the secrecy?
"A man is but the product of his thoughts what he thinks, he becomes." -Mahatma Gandhi
Is there any way I can buy all items on said list with One Click, considering it is their novel patented original technological innovation?
SEATTLE (AP) - Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) on Monday said sales of consumer electronics surpassed book sales for the first time and was its largest sales category over the Thanksgiving weekend, launching the online retailer's busiest holiday selling season in 10 years.
So, erm, they had a bigger day back in like, 1994?
I bought 5 books on Amazon that day-- I used up my gift certificates from Christmas and ordered a textbook for next semester.
What they neglected to mention was that this is because of patent pressure, they are now the only online-store in the united states.
I don't mean to be a KW (Karma Whore), but that is a staggering amount. Looking at it from a geek perspective, their system has to be such to be able to handle hundreds of thousands of simultaneous surfers and dozens of simultaneous buyers. They clearly have managed to scale-up their operations in such a way that does not negatively impact the operation of their site to the detriment of sales. Way to go, Jeff & Co!
A blog like any other.
I'm still hearing conflicting reports on the holiday season overall - it was great, it was terrible, it was tepid... I'm still not sure how things went down; I know this year my wife and I probably spent a little less than last year despite our earning over 40% more than last year.
This is great news...maybe. I would just like more context.
I'd like to point out that Amazon DOES NOT use MySQL before the MySQL kiddies say "see, it can scale!"
I don't respond to AC's.
Not only that, most of the pages on the site are either encrypted or customized (via datamining), or both. I wonder what kind of servers they're running?
Does anyone have any statistics on how many items say, a single retail store (like Wal-mart) sells in a single day? How about all of the stores in a chain. Data like that would help put things in perspective.
What is it about the iWon.com site that makes me feel all slimy and dirty? Is it the fact that they're major purveyors of spam? Or could it be all the "popup blocker" ads they run to fund their site, duping the rubes into thinking there's a downloadable software solution to the problem that they and their ilk are doing everything to promote--the indiscriminate installation of spyware, malware, and popups.
It's mildly interesting that Amazon is breaking sales records, but I don't believe a word from that awful site... and as another poster already mentioned-- there's damn little content in the article.
Everything I've ever learned the hard way was based on a statistically invalid sample.
OneDay shopping. You don't tell anyone about something you're patenting until AFTER you patent it! Jeez, pay attention.
Meanwhile, let's get some prior art going, people! I've got Monday.
Please help metamoderate.
As the article says, 32 items per second were sold on average during the day. So that would mean a store with, say, 16 tills, would all need to be processing more than two items per second every second.. I find that a little hard to believe.
And not a dime of profit :).
www.lonseidman.com
Score:-1, Bad at math
He had a point, you just missed it. He was pointing out the sloppy writing by whoever wrote that article. Saying "busiest... in 10 years" implies that they were busier 10 years ago. If it was absolutely necessary to point out that Amazon has been in business for that long, they should have said something like "busiest... in their 10 year history".
hinderfreude ('hin-dur-"froi-d&), n. The feeling of joy derived from being in the way.
That was true in 1998 but now you're way out of date:
A survey by Thomson First Call put analysts' average estimates at earnings of 39 cents a share on revenue of $2.42 billion.
In the fourth quarter of last year, the Seattle online merchant earned 17 cents a share on $1.95 billion in revenue.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Ever been in a Walmart? How many times to you hear a 'beep' as an item is registered at the checkout?
I suspect most large, busy stores clock around 20-30 items sold per second on a regular basis. An enterprise the scale of WalMart might clock in thousands per second for all stores on exceptionally busy days.
This might be a 'record day' for Amazon, but it's hardly news.